ACTOR Colin Ferguson hopes his new series – Sci Fi’s “Eureka” – lasts longer than his last one.
That’s because his last one was “Coupling,” the ballyhooed ensemble comedy about yuppie New York couples that was positioned by NBC in 2003 as the successor to “Friends.” Unfortunately, after a summer of intense promotion, “Coupling” flopped and was cancelled after four weeks at the outset of the 2003-04 season.
Ferguson says he took the cancellation in stride. “‘Coupling’ gave me so much press and it gave me so much exposure that even when it went south, it was always such a positive experience for me,” he said on the phone last week from Vancouver, where he was filming the final episode of the season of “Eureka,” which premieres on Sci Fi this week.
Ferguson, who will turn 34 on Saturday (July 22), has been around the TV business long enough not to get his hopes up.
“I’m always the one to wait until the numbers come in before I buy the new house,” he said.
Still, he might have good reason to be optimistic about “Eureka,” a new, quirky drama about a fictional town in Oregon named Eureka, which the government has populated with geniuses who work on various secret projects aimed at solving some of the world’s problems.
The gathering of so many high I.Q.’s in one place creates the potential for behavior ranging from harmlessly eccentric to dangerously devious. And indeed, “Eureka” is being described as a cross between “Twin Peaks” and “Northern Exposure.” It could also be described safely as a potential hit. With its strange mixture of light and dark, comedy and drama, “Eureka” should pull in the same audience who made “The 4400” on sister channel USA a smash when it debuted in July 2004.
“I’m hopeful. I’m optimistic. I do want this one to go well. I would love this experience to keep going,” Ferguson says of “Eureka,” in which he plays Jack Carter, a federal marshall who comes upon the town after he gets lost driving south to Los Angeles with a fugitive – his runaway, teenaged daughter, Zoe (Jordan Hinson).
A series of circumstances keeps the marshall and his daughter in Eureka throughout the show’s two-hour premiere this week. And at the end of the episode, circumstances conspire to keep them there.
“Eureka” is an ensemble drama whose cast includes Joe Morton (from movies such as “The Brother from Another Planet,” “Terminator 2” and “Speed”), Debrah Farentino (“NYPD Blue”) and Salli Richardson-Whitfield (“Family Law,” “Antwone Fisher”).
But, since he’s in almost every scene, Ferguson is the show’s star.
“It’s mid-July and I haven’t had a day off since March,” Ferguson said of the show’s grueling sevendaysa-week production schedule.
“Definitely there’s a lot riding on me because I’m the guy who’s in everyday and I’m the guy who’s in a lot of the scenes.” As the premiere episode demonstrates, three female characters are all potential love interests for the married-but-separated Carter, although one in particular has the inside track.
“He’s going for Allison [Richardson-Whitfield],” Ferguson admitted, adding that their relationship is slow to develop.
“It takes me 10 episodes just to take off my wedding ring, so I’m dealing with my own demons and actually her ex-husband comes to town and it takes them a long while to sort out their stuff. But there’s something there for sure.”
EUREKA
Tuesday, 9 p.m., Sci Fi
